Photo of the day: 2-25-10

Photo of the day: Wednesday 2-24-10

A photo a day

I’m setting a new challenge for myself – to post a new photo every day. EVERY day. I have been so bad about posting anything lately, and I’ve allowed myself to get caught up in silly school politics and trying to save the world. Really, all I want to focus on right now is my family, my home and my art. So without further ado, here is the first “photo of the day.”

Hard to say goodbye

I hate saying goodbye.

Friends, real friends, are so hard to come by in this world. And when they move on, even though you knew it was coming, even when you have known from the very beginning that they were only with you for a while, it can be hard to bear.

It was a bittersweet weekend for us, full of blue skies and warm air and real friends –  the best that Savannah has to offer. But it was also the weekend we had to say goodbye to our dear friends Melinda and Stuart and their incredible children Anina and Ollie. When they joined us in Savannah two years ago we knew they were merely “on loan” from Australia. Honestly, we had them longer than I ever expected. And now it is time for them to move on to new adventures in Brooklyn and beyond.

I can’t tell you how much we will miss them.

So our amazing group of Savannah friends and neighbors has gotten a little smaller. But, cliched though it may be, we are so much richer for having them in our lives.

Something’s got to change

I don’t know how I ended up being the person talking about these things. All my life I have been one of the least healthy people I know. I don’t like to exercise. I’m not crazy about vegetables. I LOVE snacking. And let’s face it – I could stand to loose a few pounds. But I’m frightened by what is happening in our world. I’m frightened by our fast food, mass produced, super sized, everything in a hurry culture. Something’s got to change.

People are talking, and that’s a start. Our First Lady is talking. But it doesn’t feel like people are listening yet.

For a while now I have been steering clear of juice boxes and packaged snacks for our household. I’ll admit that part of that is that I am becoming horribly frugal, but part is that I just don’t see the need – or the benefit. I can make cookies at home in minutes, and they taste better, are better for us, and cost less than anything I can buy at the grocery store. But I’m not hard-core by any stretch. So I find it a little odd that I am so up in arms over some of what I see happening at Fletcher’s school . . .

But I am up in arms. And if no one else is going to say anything then I guess I have to.

Our country is in the midst of an epidemic. According to First Lady Michelle Obama’s new initiative ,  obesity rates have tripled in the past 30 years. This trend means that, for the first time in our history, American children may face a shorter expected lifespan than their parents. That is terrifying. Our schools should be fighting this battle on the front line, setting an example for our children and educating our community.

But instead, we push candy bars for fundraisers, we give giant Coke floats (3 big scoops of ice cream and a full glass of Coke) to 5 year olds as reward for attending Science Night, the PTA rolls a snack cart through the halls pushing Air Heads, Slim Jims and 500 calorie chocolate chocolate chip muffins all in the name of a dollar – or a dime, as the case may be. And my vegetarian child can never buy school lunch because there are no meat-free options. None.

Something has got to change.

I’m getting tired of always being the one to stand up. But I can’t sit idly by and watch us sending an entire generation to an early grave.

Something has got to change.

This video, Jamie Oliver accepting a TED award, says it much more effectively than I ever could. Please watch. And please do something. Do something for your own children, but just as importantly (I fear I may be preaching to the choir here) do something for other children. For the children in your school, your neighborhood, for an entire generation. Do something.

The magic of Southern snow

We didn’t really believe it would happen. We wanted to believe. The whole city, it seemed, wanted to believe. Everyone was talking about it yesterday as wintery weather swept across the South. All of Savannah was darn near giddy in anticipation. And yet, though we all played along, none of us really expected it to snow. Not here. Not really.

The rain was cold and miserable all day, but the temperature refused to dip into the 30’s. Snow was seeming more and more unlikely. But like Santa Claus or fairies . . . maybe snow in the South just needs you to believe in it hard enough to make it real.

We spent the evening snuggled in the playroom watching the opening ceremonies for the winter Olympics and waiting. We kept the children up far past their bedtime – just in case. We listened to the rain pounding down on the roof and I told the kids that we would know when it started to snow because it would be quiet outside, that magical hush of falling snow. We waited. And waited. Lola Gray fell asleep on the couch.

And then . . .

it happened!!! Snow. Real, honest to goodness SNOW.

Amazing.

The first snow Savannah has seen in over a decade. The first snow my children have ever seen falling from the sky. It was magical. At 9:30 at night children all over the neighborhood were skipping up and down the sidewalks, running from yard to yard, scraping snow off of cars and benches to form into icy snowballs. Friends called and sent excited text messages, Facebook lit up like crazy with exclamations and photographs confirming the snow. Fletcher and Lola, wearing footed pajamas and bathrobes under their coats, caught snowflakes on their tongues and laughed like crazy. And you know what? I did too!

The snow didn’t stick to much more than the cars and our coats, and by the time we woke up in the morning it was completely gone. But I think we are all still buzzing a bit with the amazement of it all.

Every now and then I miss living in an area with real snow fall, mourn the fact that my children will never really know the  joy of waking up in the morning to blue light and silence that can only mean one thing. Perhaps they will never be able to build a 6 foot tall snowman, but Lola made a tiny one she is keeping in a plastic container in the freezer. Perhaps Fletcher will never make it to the Olympics as a ski jumper, as is his current goal. Perhaps snow will not fall on Savannah again for another decade, but I’ve decided it doesn’t matter. We had an incredible, magical night, a once in a lifetime night where an entire city full of children experienced snow fall for the first time. Together.

Sappy, I know. But true.

Last night I took a walk with my family while snow fell on Savannah, Georgia. Miracles really do happen.

Places we are not

Photos have been removed – my aunt is very upset with me over totally unrelated issues and has requested that I not use her photographs. I am complying. It’s a shame – the photographs were truly beautiful. I’m not removing the post entirely because, at the time I wrote it, it made me happy thinking about my family far away. Maybe someday I will feel that way again . . . so I’m keeping the post as is.

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It is snowing.

But not here.

Here it is a (comparatively) balmy 53. Tomorrow it will be 64. The sun is shining and the sky is blue and I am very glad for that . . .

Kinda . . .

In the place where we are not, the place where my family lives, it looks like this today.

And I’m just the tiniest bit jealous.

(Thanks for the photos, Aunt Martha! Wish we were there!)

I {heart} you

The kids and I made these adorable crayon hearts today to give to their classmates for Valentine’s Day! This is a great way to use up all those bits and pieces of old crayons – just remove the wrappers and place the bits into a mini muffin tin – ours was heart shaped for Valentine’s Day but round ones would work just as well. Place the tin into a 250 degree oven for 10-15 minutes and viola! New, multi-colored crayons!

I’m thinking we will attach the crayons to a piece of construction paper with a cute saying like “You color my world.”

I did it!

I wasn’t terribly fast, but I finished my first 5K! In fact, I finished it while pushing a stroller full of two children much too large to still be in a stroller.

And the craziest thing was that it was really fun!

Not so much the stroller part . . . that just sort of happened out of necessity and it was actually incredibly frustrating. The fact that for the first time ever I was pushing, what . . . 80 pounds worth of kids in the stroller? (Neither of them has ridden in a stroller for years now!) That was hard enough. But then I also made the mistake of getting at the very back of the pack, thinking I was being courteous. What I didn’t realize was that I was behind all the walkers, and they kept lining up 4 and 5 across the lane so I couldn’t  pass! And of course I had to stop every now and then for Fletcher to climb in and out of the stroller. He did run part of the way, maybe even as much as a  mile of the 3.2, but never for very long at a time.

But the point is that I finished. My time according to my iPhone running app was 44 minutes, which was right around a 14 minute mile. I’m pretty sure I can do a lot better next time.

After the 5K we met up with friends, collected our post-race Power-Ade for the kids and beer for me, then stood in the rain to watch the half-marathon. It was surprisingly fun to stand there shivering and cheering as the main pack of runners passed the half-way point – and the front-runners turned the corner into the home stretch! When Raymond came back around on his way to the finish line, Fletcher ran out to join him and they ran across the finish line together. It was really sweet.

So all in all I would say the experiment was a success! I can’t imagine I will ever be a real runner, and I still think anyone who runs more than a 10K is out of their mind, but I enjoyed it enough to give it another try! There are quite a few more races coming up as we enter Spring. Next time, Raymond is watching the kids. Once with the extra 80 pounds was enough for me!